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Note to Ryder Cup captain Jim Furyk: Don’t overthink this. Tiger Woods is back. Put him on the 2018 team. Tiger’s driver took most of the weekend off, but the rest of his game was humming along as if he climbed into a grey DeLorean and set the Flux Capacitor to the year 2000. He didn’t break the 10-year drought of winning majors, but let the golfing world know he is a viable threat...

Brooks Koepka might have felt more breath on his neck if it wasn't quite so thick. Try to push him in the back. Go on, just try. See if he gives an inch. Koepka is now one of the most substantial golfers in the world with his victory in the PGA Championship, and the proof of it was that not even a mighty 64 by Tiger Woods was quite enough to shake him. It is hard to think of anything more ratifying...

We are officially halfway through the NBA offseason. Six weeks ago, the basketball world was still wrapping its collective head around LeBron James joining the Los Angeles Lakers as a free agent. Six weeks from now, training camps will open across the country as the 2018-19 season gets underway. That makes right now - the in-between place, when those whose lives revolve around basketball take...

Shalane Flanagan was supposed to be done with competitive running after last year’s New York City Marathon. Then she won it, ending a four-decade drought for American women as she broke the tape crying, shrieking a profanity and pumping her fist. Five months later, in April, the four-time Olympian was back on the starting line in Boston, finishing seventh, and in 82 days on Nov. 4, at...

On a balmy July afternoon, seven teenage boys stand around a backyard trampoline taking turns bouncing. It’s the kind of scene that might be repeated at many suburban homes, except that these kids aren’t doing seat drops and belly flops. They’re doing triple, quadruple, even quintuple flips (yes, that’s five rotations in the air). The boys bounce a breathtaking 12 feet...

Tijjani Zakari stepped into a dusty boxing ring in northern Nigeria and wound thick, threaded cord around his right fist and forearm. For this fighter, the wrap was more battering ram than padded glove. Zakari squared up to his opponent, squatting low with his bound arm cocked at his side. Less than a minute after the opening whistle, he landed an echoing blow that floored his opponent. A thousand...

When Brandon Scherff leaves the practice field, the Washington Redskins' starting right guard often picks up his son, Easton, and holds him like Simba from "The Lion King." He carries the 10-month old over to the blocking sled and taps his baby hands against them. One day, a team staffer remarked that the younger Scherff could follow his father's footsteps - although what it means to be...

Marcia Kislinger was dying, taking her last breaths, but her family wasn't there yet. They had just been notified. They were rushing from their homes to her bedside at Providence St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica. They were worried they wouldn't arrive in time, and the 63-year-old woman would die alone. As they raced into her room, they suddenly stopped, struck with the oddest of...

Laura Gillman wasn’t going to miss this one. The mother of Kristen Gillman flew into Nashville, Tenn. on Saturday night to grab a front row seat to watch her daughter play in the finals of the U.S. Women’s Amateur at the Golf Club of Tennessee, just a few miles west of Nashville. With a Lake Travis High School logo on her sleeve and an Alabama hat on her head, Gillman sank a putt on No...

We’re taking a tour of the top quarterback, running back and wide receiver of every Big 12 team. Today’s triplets: Oklahoma State. QB:
Taylor Cornelius (2017 — 6 of 10 for 148 yards, including a 56-yarder, but made it into only 5 games; Texas history — Has never faced the
Longhorns.) RB:
Justice Hill (2017 — 268 carries for 1,467 yards...

Elijah Higgins prefers mystery. The four-star wide receiver released his top seven schools on July 10 and has remained relatively quiet
about his recruiting status over the past month. The 6-3, 214-pound prospect from Austin Bowie ranked
No. 23 on the recently updated Fabulous 55. He’s considered the 16
th-best receiver prospect in the 2019 class and holds...

Katie Ledecky was not angling to become the face of American swimming when she joined the Palisades Porpoises as a 6-year-old. Her grand goal was to make it to the other side of the 25-yard pool without having to stop and rest on the lane line. “Swimming is really just for me still a hobby,” Ledecky said. Then she caught herself. “It’s more than that now, I guess.” Ledecky...

At the start of the last Premier League season, Liverpool fans had some fun online passing around a picture labeled “Liverpool FC as a car.” The image showed one vehicle Frankensteined together from the parts of three: The front was a sports car, the center a boring family sedan and the back a rusted junker missing its wheels. And for the first half of last season, the image seemed to...

Next year is the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising in 1969, when demonstrations after a police raid of a Greenwich Village bar helped kindle the modern gay rights movement. The commemoration of such a seminal moment for gay people is expected to draw millions to New York next June for festivals, parades and cultural celebrations. Amid it all, a surprising participant has gingerly emerged...

The release of Madden NFL marks the 30th anniversary of the most popular sports video game of all time. While it has generated more than $4 billion in revenue and inspired three decades' worth of gamers and football fans, some of Madden's humble roots can be traced to a start-up company working out of a house in Bethesda, Maryland, and an early football game that featured slow-moving dots in lieu...

At Wimbledon in 1968, Rod Laver and Billie Jean King became the first champions of the strawberries-and-cream crowd in tennis' open era. When it came time to cash a paycheck, though, the shared experience ended. Laver was paid roughly $2,600, while King walked away with $970. The loud and uncomfortably clear message it delivered: There was a difference in those championship achievements, right down...

This is what second-class citizenship in pro sports looks like: Last summer, the Minnesota Lynx lost home-court advantage for the entirety of the WNBA playoffs despite having finished the regular season with a league-best 27-7 record. They were forced off their regular season-long floor in St. Paul's Xcel Energy Center to make way for the local NHL franchise, the Wild. The Wild wasn't in the...

He looks like a kid. Not when he plays, because at 6 feet and 237 pounds, Rafael Devers has a major league body that helps him blend in with teammates, all at least two years his senior. It's in the locker room, where his face - the one that earned him the childhood nickname "Carita," Spanish for "baby face" - often reveals a bright smile and belly laugh. He acts like a kid. Not...

Pat Neshek is 37 years old. He's 10 years removed from elbow surgery, and his right arm has survived the last eight seasons. He has pitched for seven teams and made the playoffs five times, but he still lacks the World Series ring that would be the cherry on top of a fine career. So, when he decided last December to re-sign with a Phillies team that lost 96 games last season, many of his fans on Twitter...

The summer of Kristen Gillman got a little hotter on Sunday. Gillman, a 2016 graduate of Lake Travis High, put on a golf clinic at the Golf Club of Tennessee to win her second U.S. Women’s Amateur championship by routing Alabama teammate Jiwon Joen 7 and 6 to join a short list of players to win multiple amateur championships. The 20-year-old Gillman becomes just the fourth player in nearly four...

At his first two media days, Texas State head coach Everett Withers preached patience while he and his staff changed the culture in San Marcos. In his first season in 2016, Withers dismantled an underachieving team from the previous season that had preseason hopes for the program’s first bowl game. The Bobcats finished 3-9 in 2015. Over 30 players left the team before his first game –...

Texas A&M’s coaches and players dressed in their normal maroon and white game-day attire Sunday morning and gathered en masse for a team photo in a corner of Kyle Field. Week two of preseason training camp was drawing to a close. The season is so, so close. The quarterback situation has yet to be decided — competition could continue long past A&M’s season opener against Northwestern...

As the NFL’s exhibition season gets into full swing this week, all eyes will be on the bumper crop of rookie quarterbacks: five first-rounders for the first time since 1999. Who will be the next Donovan McNabb? Who will be the next Tim Couch? This week will start to provide the answers. Here’s a look at the games ahead and where the young quarterbacks stand: Mayfield won the Heisman Trophy...

The third game of the series between the Round Rock Express and Omaha Storm Chasers was suspended due to rain Saturday. The contest was halted tied 2-2 in the top of the fifth with two men on base and one out for Omaha. The game will resume Sunday at 4:30 p.m. The series finale will be seven innings and follow 30 minutes after the completion of the first game. Fans with tickets to Saturday’s...

Somehow, Aroldis Chapman was able to prevent this game from slipping away. Rain pouring off his hat, the New York Yankees closer struck out Jurickson Profar with the bases loaded in a steady storm to end it, preserving a 5-3 win over the Texas Rangers on Saturday. “You concentrate on the catcher, you try to keep your hand as dry as possible, you try to keep the ball as dry as possible, and you...

Joe Dumars, Mark Henry and Lacey Henderson are three athletic greats from three different generations. They have walked different paths in their athletic journeys but share an identical message when it comes to dealing with young people. It all starts at home. Parents are the real coaches. Before a kid ever picks up a baseball bat, throws a football or joins a team at school, the folks play the most...

Alabama’s Kristen Gillman, a graduate of Lake Travis High, defeated Kaylee Benton of Arkansas on the 19th hole Saturday to advance to the final of the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship in Kingston Springs, Tenn. Gillman’s victory sets up a championship match with another member of the Alabama golf team, junior Jiwon Jeon. Jeon defeated a third Alabama golfer, senior Lauren Stephenson...

The senior class for Texas State football got a little smaller last week as defensive end Ishmael Davis and receiver Mason Hays were reclassified, allowing them to play this season and next. Both players were granted an extra year of eligibility via a hardship waiver after their season was cut short due to injury last year. Davis, a graduate student, was awarded a scholarship before the 2016 season...

Start bringing your pickaxes, pans and metal detectors out to Texas football practices for the next three weeks. Mining for
nuggets about this group could prove difficult. Throughout the first week, Texas coach Tom Herman was positive but subdued about his charges. The Longhorns had their first
team scrimmage Saturday, and while it wasn’t open to the public or reporters...

Texas coach Tom Herman said a report on Facebook was “absolutely untrue” that he was the one who alerted sports reporter Brett
McMurphy about fired Ohio State assistant coach Zach Smith’s alleged history of domestic violence. In a story posted Saturday on the social media site, Jeff Snook, a published author with deep Ohio State ties, claimed that
Herman...

News breaks, headlines are made, but nothing can stop the inevitable nature of the NASCAR season. Specifically, the impending conclusion of it. There are only four races left in the 2018 Cup Series regular season. We'll start in Michigan this weekend, then head to Bristol, Darlington and finally Indianapolis. And then, along with the 16 best drivers the sport can proffer, we'll go onward to the playoffs...

Arnaldo Hernandez allowed just two hits over seven innings, leading the Omaha Storm Chasers over the Round Rock Express in a 2-0 win Friday at Dell Diamond. Richard Lovelady struck Nomar Mazara out with a runner on first to end the game for his sixth save of the season and the eighth straight loss for the Express. Mazara is rehabbing for the Texas Rangers, playing as the designated hitter for Round...

The land of Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Louis Oosthuizen and Charl Schwartzel could be delivering another winner of a major title. With his second straight solid round at the PGA Championship on Friday, South Africa’s Brandon Stone is one good weekend away from breaking through at the same course where the godfather of golf in his country, Gary Player, completed the career grand slam a generation...

And so the match goes to penalty kicks. The Austin City Council will try again next week after stopping short of voting late Thursday to allow the owner of the Columbus Crew to build a privately financed Major League Soccer stadium in North Austin. Next up: another special council meeting Wednesday morning, when Mayor Steve Adler promises the stadium proposal finally will be resolved with an...

Coach Jason Garrett saw all he needed out of quarterback Dak Prescott on just one drive. Prescott made the most of his brief appearance in the preseason opener for Dallas by throwing a 30-yard touchdown pass to rookie Michael Gallup on his only drive before the San Francisco 49ers rallied with two late touchdowns to beat the Cowboys 24-21 Thursday night. “I thought it was a good drive by our...

Kellen Moore’s college coach heard from his former quarterback while Moore was thinking about trading in his helmet for a whistle. The next thing Chris Petersen knew, Moore was in charge of Dak Prescott as quarterbacks coach of the Dallas Cowboys not too long after sitting third on the depth chart behind the 2016 NFL offensive rookie of the year. “When I heard that, I think, ‘Really?...

For the first time in four years, a Texas volleyball player not named
Cat McCoy will be wearing black on a full-time basis. McCoy, UT’s longtime libero, is gone, and she took her Texas record of 1,801 career digs with her to grad school and the beach
volleyball court at the University of Washington. Juniors Autumn Rounsaville and Claire Hahn are among the candidates...

We’re taking a tour of the top quarterback, running back and wide receiver of every Big 12 team. Today’s triplets: Oklahoma. QB:
Kyler Murray (2017 — 18 of 21 for 359 yards, 3 TDs and no INTs, as Baker Mayfield’s backup; Texas history — he didn’t play last year against
the Longhorns. RB:
Rodney Anderson (2017 — 188 carries...

Jackie Acevedo Pope stood in front of the Austin City Council on Thursday evening and articulated the benefits a Major League Soccer franchise could bring for soccer-playing girls and women in Central Texas. Precourt Sports Ventures “will support Lonestar girls developmental academy,” said Pope, a coach at youth soccer behemoth Lonestar Soccer Club who grew up in the Texas capital and...

The
updated 2019 Fabulous 55 was released and it brought upon changes to the list after a summer filled with elite camps and 7-on-7 tournaments. There
wasn’t a ton of major movement. Only two new players made the list, and the biggest move was 18 spots by Texas A&M commit
and Brock tight end Baylor Cupp. He and TCU offensive tackle commit Kori Roberson...

LeBron James or Betsy DeVos? If you could pick from two candidates to be nation's secretary of education and those were your candidates, whom would you pick? That is the point of an online petition posted late Tuesday on Care2.com and titled "LeBron James for Secretary of Education." By midday Thursday, there were 11,348 signatures, and the surge of signatures caused organizers to keep increasing...

His reputation as a superior athlete preceded Zion Williamson's arrival on Duke's campus this summer. He's the kid from South Carolina with all those dunk videos online. Check out YouTube, where highlight packages of the 6-7, 285-pound Williamson's dunks are approaching 2 million page views. His teammates are now seeing what all the fuss is about. "I've never seen an athlete like him," Duke...

On Wednesday afternoon, the NCAA's Board of Governors and Division I Board of Directors dropped the mic on college basketball and the sports world. After coming off a season that included an FBI investigation into the ugliness of the sport, the firing of a hall of fame coach (Rick Pitino), and investigations and subpoenas into multiple programs, an announcement was made that will see groundbreaking...

Northeast Ohio offers a tale of two legacies. LeBron James departed for Los Angeles earlier this summer and left behind a spectacular gift for his hometown Akron, Ohio: a new elementary school for at-risk children and tens of millions of dollars for college scholarships. An hour’s drive to the north, the Cleveland Cavaliers lost that same superstar. But Dan Gilbert, the team’s billionaire...

Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson used to be seen as flip sides of the same generation. Woods was a two-seat Lamborghini, built for performance. He stood out from the crowd and left little room for others. Mickelson was a Subaru SUV, built for crowds. He was bulky and could accommodate everybody. But those earlier versions, of Woods and Mickelson in their 20s and 30s, have given way in middle age to...

There are a few rules to live by in fantasy football, such as, never take a kicker before the final round. Here's another important rule: Don't assume that whatever happened last year will happen again this year. One of the challenges in fantasy football is that the real-life sport on which it's based equates to a minefield of small sample sizes. Even an entire season consists of just 16 games - less...

He is a sight, Southern Phantom, with a face as white as a bedsheet and a blue eye to match his brown one. His tail is all Spice Girl, ponytailed with blonde streaks. His legs? All four of them seemingly sport ivory knee-high socks. And Southern Phantom’s nature? Sweet as the sugar cubes held out in the open hands of the many visitors at Barn 46 here who just have to see this unusual colt with...